King Me
by Pearla
Summary: Pre-Landsmeet. This resides in the Serendipity world. A little bit of sad smut.


Title: King Me  
Author: Pearla  
Rating: M  
Characters: Alistair/Scarlett  
_Author's Note: I wrote this almost a year ago. This is definitely where the Sun King idea started. Resides in the Ballad of the Sun King world. I would love feedback on this. Also subject to edits._

_I know I dreamed you a sin and a lie,  
I have my freedom but I don't have much time  
Faith has been broken tears must be cried,  
Let's do some living after we die  
__-Wild Horses, The Sundays_

. . . . . . . . . . . . . .

In her wildest dreams Scarlett dreamed of being queen, she'd always imagined having a king by her side. Not a teyrna, no that was to be Fergus: A teyrn. It was such silly thinking. She was ten then, just on the cusp of becoming.

When she was eighteen she watched her family perish. She fled to become a Grey Warden. She killed maleficarum and abominations, gained the ally of the Dalish and dwarves of Orzammar, even found the ashes of Andraste. Somewhere in between she fell in love; heart pounding, dizzying love.

She gathered all the hope she had and took a small pouch of the ashes and brought back the man who was supposed to rescue them all. Eamon didn't, couldn't. He only told Scarlett that she had to make a choice. There was no one else to rule the throne other than a queen and she held that title tenuously. All it would take is enough of the landsmeet to disagree and a regent would be placed.

"Alistair..." Eamon forces his hand up indicating, making all eyes focus in the room.

_No, oh no. _Part of her thinks, closing her eyes, but hearing herself all the while say, "Yes, yes. He is a Theirin."_ I sound like mother. Wise choices, so sure._

"This is our best option," Eamon continues. "We could convince the landsmeet easily enough I think. They loved Maric quite well." He fiddles and gathers up his papers at his desk, waiting for Scarlett to speak.

"You should be asking me, shouldn't you?" Alistair isn't calm now, he's hardly coherent with anger bubbling to the surface. Maric's bastard in the most obvious ways, sometimes.

She's trying to smile bravely, when inside she's berating herself not expecting _this. _"No, I don't think there is much choice here."

"Look, I won't be any good. I don't know anything!" Gesturing with his armored hands, the candlelight bouncing off them the faint light, he is doubting himself when the choice is already made, fighting.

"We don't have any other options..."_Yes, we could run. Don't say this to yourself. _She gathers herself up, glad for her armor and the swords slung over her back.

He's looking at her, begging her for this not to be. That this shouldn't be happening. He turns and walks out, the door slamming hard, rattling Eamon's books and wall hangings.

"I think the choice has been made for him, it's his duty." Isolde is interjecting quietly, her accent tinkling sweetly.

_And that's just how things are. _

She searches him out, knocking on the door. Finds him leaning against the bedpost, gauntlets, sword and shield laid out by the bed. He looks at Scarlett, her long hair tightly placed away in a bun, her eyes green marked with remorse and sorrow.

"I'm sorry. I wanted-" _ Something other than this?_

"Then I am to be king." The bitterness is tugging his lips down, his eyes drawn with them. "What about you and I?"

Words are drying up in her mouth and the silencing is building between them, awkwardness where there never was before.

In lieu of this deficient silence his hands are reaching out to her, drawing her lips to his, the sounds smothered. Snatching the pins from her hair, ripping her borrowed gown. Words choked against her shoulder as he pulls her legs up, slides his calloused hands up her thighs to her center, slipping in. Her mouth gasping as his lips caress along her neck, his other hands wrapped softly around her breast as he draws himself down lower. Then he is inside her, Alistair forcing her against the gritty wall, the waves building in them together; the unknowable last of _as_ _one_ wrapped within the other.

After he is curled away from her, his legs drawn up, cold. "I want you to leave."

There is nothing she can say to him now and all her words could not save her from this.

Thoughts jumbled as she gathering all the clothes she could find she flees the room, her hand balancing her against the wall along the dark corridor toward what she hopes is her room, the tears falling on her bruised collar. Her voice is mantra inside her:_ No, please, no no no. _

Zevran looms up out of the darkness his back toward her, perhaps she cried out to him because when he turns his eyebrows rise up at the sight of her disheveled appearance. His features turn sly and then soften at the look on her face. To his credit he doesn't speak or smile or _joke, _hejust directs her through the impossibly dark night.


End file.
